Strategic Schools

Improvement work is often a long-term endeavour. In the messy middle, our teams can lose track of the progress they are making and the lessons they are learning. In this episode, Simon explores the importance of setting up a regular rhythm of celebrating and course-correcting. 

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How can we more effectively understand and respond to change resistance? Attuning with empathy can provide fresh insights into what’s really happening for those who are experiencing the change on the ground. In this episode, Simon explores simple framework leaders can use to develop a theory of resistance and identify the next best steps. 

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If we are going to be successful in leading organisational change, we need to start small. In this episode, Simon explores the critical importance of running disciplined, fast experiments of educational change before scaling up. Simon shows why starting small, moving fast, and failing well is a powerful approach for working out how to make an evidence-informed idea work in your unique context. 

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How can you motivate yourself to engage in challenging work even when you don’t feel like doing it?  In this episode, Simon explores a powerful reframing of how we can approach the work in front of us. He shows how shifting from ‘We Have To” to ‘We Get To’ can unlock new focus and energy for change.

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Are you and your team ready to learn from failure?  Simon argues that improvers test and sharpen their ideas by trying things out in the real world of schools and classrooms. The goal shouldn’t be to get everything right from the beginning.  But rather to set ourselves up to learn our way forward and make better mistakes every term.  Simon shows why building a culture of curiosity and learning from praise worthy failure is crucial for continuous improvement in complex environments like schools.

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How can we tap into the power of doing less?  Simon explores our tendency to become overloaded and outlines a practical approach to setting and keeping clear boundaries. He explores why flexing our ‘saying no’ muscle is crucial for creating and holding space to engage in our most important work. 

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What should we first expect to see? Simon unpacks a simple framework for focusing on the most important lead indicators in our change efforts. He argues that leaders should focus on the essential changes we should we in 3 and 6 months and avoid getting stuck in conversations about the long-term outcomes we are hoping to move. Lead indicators can motivate our teams and accelerate our learning from doing. 

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How can future pacing the term ahead help us to create greater levels of sustainability in our workflow?
In this episode, Simon outlines a simple routine individuals and teams can use in order to anticipate their future workload demands, identify pinch points and then creatively explore how to reduce the peaks of demand. Workload mapping can be completed in just 5-10 minutes. A simple tool that can reduce future stress and enhance effectiveness. 

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How can we gain enhanced clarity in our improvement thinking? Simon unpacks 4 key questions that educational leaders can use to test, refine and sharpen their improvement projects and ideas. He then outlines how leaders and teams can build a habit of using these questions to structure their strategic conversations about improvement. 

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How should we respond to resistance? In this episode Simon explores a radical shift in how we can approach the natural resistance all leaders will experience when leading a change journey. He unpacks key findings from behavioural science and offers 3 simple strategies to help unlock adult behaviour change. 

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